May 03, 2015

Switch to Silent Mode for Carmen Disruption

Photo courtesy of the Almeida Theatre

As I
waited in the Almeida Theatre’s lobby before viewing Carmen Disruption by Simon Stephens and directed by Michael
Longhurst, I perused my program. How coincidental that the very thing I was
reading about paralleled a long time fear of my own: technology and its
detrimental effects. Stephens, the award-winning playwright behind The Curious Incident of the Dog in the
Night-Time (reviewed on my blog here),
wanted to channel how media alienates and disconnects human relationships. He
was also intrigued by the way in which European cities all start to blur into
one. The unusual medium that he chose to tell his story was opera, specifically
Georges Bizet’s Carmen. While
Stephens was listening to the music from Carmen
on the Underground, he realized that people’s lives possess operatic
elements and he set out to reveal the inner Carmen in all of us.

The singer (Sharon Small), photo courtesy of Marc Brenner

In the
United States, 40 percent of people admit to being lonely, a number that has
doubled in 30 years. In Britain, a registered charity is devoted to ending chronic
loneliness. As Elizabeth Renzetti notes in the program, “It is the great irony
of our age that we have never been better connected, or more adrift.” I second
this sentiment wholeheartedly. In fact, some might say that my soapbox is
talking about the way we use our phones and social media and how this is
resulting in a society where we are more alone than ever before. Not only are
we isolating ourselves from human interactions and relationships, but we are
also forgetting how to forge those relationships in the first place.

This is
the age of dating apps like Tinder, where someone can say whatever they please while
finding comfort in the protective aspects of their phone. Translate that to the
real world, and suddenly, the same individual doesn’t have the confidence to
recite the same line in person. Stephens muses, “How many truly fascinating
conversations have you been part of, then pulled out of when you get a text
message? We start to split ourselves off from other people.” This is a question
we should all ask ourselves, yet it is most likely avoided because of what the
answer might unveil. I could rant about this topic for hours, but I will spare
you all and turn back to the matter at hand.

Don José (Noma Dumezweni), photo courtesy of Marc Brenner

Carmen appears to have been given a new
burst of life in London at the moment. The opera is currently running at the
English National Opera. I have never seen it in person, but after watching it
for the first time on DVD, I was hooked. I recently attended a performance of
Matthew Bourne’s The Car Man, which was
a sensually modern retelling of the original through dance (review coming
soon). Last but not least, the Almeida Theatre is presenting Carmen
Disruption, where a disruption is exactly what we received.

If you
are unfamiliar with the storyline of Carmen,
it is most likely one that you already know because it is rooted in love, jealousy,
and human nature. The opera is based on a novella by Prosper Mérimée. It charts
the love triangle between feisty cigarette factory worker Carmen, solider Don
José, and bullfighter Escamillo. She dangerously toys with the two men’s hearts
until she is eventually killed by Don José when Carmen seems to favor
Escamillo. Carmen’s death outside of the bullfighting arena coincides with
Escamillo’s killing of the bull inside the arena.

Carmen (Jack Farthing), photo courtesy of Marc Brenner

Carmen Disruption alluded to this tragic ending with
a silent but forceful character in the shape of a dying bull. The
realistic-looking animal, with its chest heaving up and down, acted as an
inescapable foreshadowing that could not be avoided throughout the entirety of
the play. The performance had its own versions of the characters from the
opera. This time around, Don José (Norma Dumezweni) was a hardened taxi driver,
Escamillo (John Light) was a money-crazed global trader, Carmen (Jack Farthing)
was a stunning, self-absorbed male prostitute, and Micaëla (who was supposed to
marry Don José; Katie West) was a disillusioned teenager. Then there was the singer (Sharon Small), who travelled to different cities playing the role
of Carmen throughout the play, and the mysterious chorus member (Viktoria
Vizin), the spirit of Carmen.

Vizin is
an internationally-renowned mezzo-soprano and has played Carmen 100 times in 17
productions overall. As she belted out the songs and arias, the unexpected
lyrics hung in the air: “We feel the skin of your telephone…” It is not the
skin of others we feel anymore from genuine human contact. There is actually a
cuddle service, where people can pay a lady for cuddles. To me, this is a sign
of the times, a sad one at that. It is human nature to crave human contact, yet
we just aren’t receiving it in the same way that we used to. The Almeida Theatre's productions always keep me on the edge of my seat, because they often deal with
serious subject matter. While the typical show tunes of the West End are
predictably feel-good, it can be a breath of fresh air to sink my teeth into
something meatier with more substance.

The
permeating intrusion of technology was felt strongly throughout the play. An
LED board flashed words at us throughout the play to indicate incoming texts or
other messages. The singer was utterly anxiety-ridden without her phone and
found conversation difficult. Carrying a suitcase of pills from location to
location, she frequently said she would need to look up details or names she
had forgotten by consulting her phone. In other words, she could not
function without it.

The paths
of the unlikely characters would cross in the street. They were so fixated on
their phones that they didn’t realize where they were going and almost bumped
into one another. This reminded me of an excellent video I saw online, where
the artist imagined a world where people never
look up from their phones and what the consequences of that might be (watch it
below).

We are
increasingly living in a digital age, where if we don’t keep up, we get left
behind. One of the lines in Carmen
Disruption is that porn tells you more about a country than anything else.
Micaëla started an online flirtationship with one of her teachers, where they would
exchange sexual Skype encounters. All of these things are examples of being
violated through a computer. Some people believe that cyber bullying cannot
exist, simply because we can all turn off our computers or other electronic
devices at any point. It is worth thinking about though that cyber bullying
would not exist if we did not have access to such devices. Micaëla goes on to
describe naked photos as honest, because that nakedness is the most honest
thing a person can give of themselves. Photos shared online are there to stay
and haunt you forever.

Micaëla (Katie West), photo courtesy of Marc Brenner

There’s a
scene in Carmen Disruption where a
boy on a motorbike was killed and the first thing that everyone did at the
crime scene was take out their phones. To document this boy’s memory, complete
strangers took selfies with his mangled body. While I was eating at a
restaurant the other day, the couple across from me were barely talking to one
another. Perhaps they had been in an argument, but the first thing the woman
did when her dessert arrived was snap a photo of it on her phone. No doubt she
will have posted that photo on some form of social media, exclaiming what a
“wonderful” meal and time out she was having with her husband. The phone
occupies an ominous space at the dinner table now. It’s the ultimate third
wheel, but through the individual’s choice.

There
seems to be a disconnect in the way that we interact with others in today's society. Micaëla
wanted someone to know her, so much so that they know what she does with her
hands when she walks. When Don José visited her son, she was moved that he
remembered how many sugars she took in her tea. She felt as though
someone noticed her and thought about her. It’s about the way we make each
other feel. It’s in these small gestures that we really get the feeling of knowingsomeone, not superficially, but
really intimately knowing them. It’s hard to do that when we’re too distracted
by our phones, when we’re in a virtual world that does not exist outside of
this real one, a life that we only get the chance to live once.

Let me take a selfie, photo courtesy of Marc Brenner

The
standouts of the night for me were Farthing (Carmen), Light
(Escamillo), and Vizin (the spirit of Carmen). Farthing oozed sexuality
and self-importance to veil an underlying mask of insecurity. Light reminded me
of Christian Bale’s Patrick Bateman in American
Psycho, speaking in the same monotonic, calculated way. Vizin beautifully
and chillingly brought the play to life with her opera singing. Although the
characters occupied the same stage space, they were each absorbed in their own
bubble. The running thread throughout the whole play that connected them was the spirit of Carmen.

It's a shame I couldn't fit the man to the right of me with his iPad in as well...

The
singer became so linked to Carmen that she didn’t know where she ended and
Carmen began. Carmen the lover, Don José the fighter, Micaëla the lost girl,
and Escamillo the macho: there are elements of all of them running through each
and every one of us. Depending on the circumstances, we choose who we let loose
into the world. Stephens’ reimagined version of Bizet’s Carmen was awakening and different, a true theatrical achievement.

I leave
you all with one of my favorite YouTube videos called “Look Up” by Gary Turk.
You might have already seen it, but I beg you to take its message to heart.
Remember to look up, people. Who knows what you could be missing when you’re
looking down.

For a
dose of disruption, book your tickets for Carmen
Disruption until May 23rdhere.

For
another great YouTube video on the same theme, view Prince Ea’s “Can We
Auto-Correct Humanity?” here. If you
would like to share your opinions on the matters discussed in this blog post,
I’d love to read them below!